Newsletter Archive: Spring 2005

Russian Avant-garde Porcelain

at
the Hermitage Rooms extended to 30 September

Thirty-five design drawings not previously on view
are now on display in Circling the Square: Avant-garde Porcelain from Revolutionary
Russia. The selection of largely unpublished and some newly-discovered
preparatory designs includes examples by famous avant-garde artists such
as Mikhail Adamovich and Nikolai Suetin. The highlight is a lively and
colourful design for the painting of a rinsing bowl executed in 1921 by
Wassily Kandinsky, one of the most influential figures in the development
of abstract art. Examples of Soviet propaganda designs are also on view,
such as the Red Sailor by Pyotr Vychegzhanin and Zinaida Kobyletskayas 1920 design
with the slogan 'Long Live the VIII Congress of Soviets.

This exhibition has been organised jointly by the State Hermitage Museum
and the Courtauld Institute of Art and is sponsored by the Russian financial
corporation URALSIB.